There was something
painful to me, somehow, in the turn the conversation had taken,
in the discussion of the rent.
"She had a very good education when she was young.
I looked into that myself," said Miss Bordereau.
Then she added, "But she has learned nothing since."
"I have always been with you," Miss Tita rejoined very mildly,
and evidently with no intention of making an epigram.
"Yes, but for that!" her aunt declared with more satirical force.
She evidently meant that but for this her niece would never have got
on at all; the point of the observation however being lost on Miss Tita,
though she blushed at hearing her history revealed to a stranger.
Miss Bordereau went on, addressing herself to me: "And what time will
you come tomorrow with the money?"
"The sooner the better. If it suits you I will come at noon."
"I am always here but I have my hours," said the old woman,
as if her convenience were not to be taken for granted.
"You mean the times when you receive?"
"I never receive. But I will see you at noon, when you come
with the money."
"Very good, I shall be punctual;" and I added, "May I shake hands with you,
on our contract?" I thought there ought to be some little form, it would
make me really feel easier, for I foresaw that there would be no other.
Besides, though Miss Bordereau could not today be called personally attractive
and there was something even in her wasted antiquity that bade one stand at
one's distance, I felt an irresistible desire to hold in my own for a moment
the hand that Jeffrey Aspern had pressed.
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